Organic agriculture means holistic production
management systems that promote and enhance agro-ecosystem health, including
biodiversity, biological cycles, and soil biological activity (holistic means
handling or dealing with an entity or activity in its entirety or wholeness
rather than with emphasis on its parts or various aspects).
Organic production systems
are based on specific and precise production, processing and handling standards.
They aim to achieve optimal agro-ecosystems that are socially, ecologically and
economically sustainable. Terms such as 'biological' and 'ecological' are also
used in an effort to describe the organic production system more clearly.
Requirements for
organically produced foods differ from those for other agricultural products in
that the production procedures, and not just the product by itself, are an
intrinsic part of the identification and labelling of, and status claims for,
such products. (To see the FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius Commission Guidelines for
the Production, Processing, Labelling and Marketing of Organically Produced
Foods (1999) - go to www.codexalimentarius.net)
Advocates of organic
agriculture believe that conventional agriculture, with its use of chemical
inputs, will not be sustainable in the long run as it leads to soil degradation
and pollution of the environment, and poses health risks for both consumers and
producers. Therefore, organic agriculture replaces manufactured inputs
(fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, etc.) by natural compost and vermiculture
biological pest controls and the growing of legumes and shade trees.
(Vermiculture is the raising of earthworms to aerate soil and/or produce
vermicast: the nutrient-rich by-product of earthworms, used as a soil
conditioner.)
The
International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM; founded 1972)
has formulated basic standards for organic products (go to www.ifoam.org for
full text). These standards are at the base of the legislation that has been
introduced in the European Union (1992), the United States (2000), Japan (2001),
and a number of other countries (including Argentina, Bolivia, India and Mexico)
that have created national legislation to regulate the market for organic
products.